My testimony

I grew up in a Christian home. My whole life I heard about Jesus. As a kid I believed because my parents told me to. When I reached my teen years I began to drift away, I eventually got so caught up in the world that Jesus became non-existent to me. At about 16 I was smoking pot , drinking, and pretty much being a typical rebel teen. By 18 my views on religion started changing drastically. I saw the bible as a bunch of children's stories that people believed because they feared dying. Once I convinced myself that there was no God life was pretty much a free for all. I tried to sleep with every girl I possibly could,I started taking pain killers, and pretty much became an egomaniac. I had a tendency to make myself look good by smashing someone else. I loved myself, I thought I was smarter, funnier, and better than anyone around me. At 23 I had a good job and a beautiful girl. Then she got pregnant. I did love her, so I married her. We wound up having 3 kids. This is where my testimony begins. See to me people who converted to Christ , did it out of desperation. They were drug addicts, alcoholics, or people that needed some kind of help, so somehow an evangelist got hold of them and convinced them of a higher power that they needed to redeem them. My story is different. At 29 I had 3 kids a gorgeous wife and a nice house in the suburbs. Life was great. I just felt something missing. Easter day 2011 my wife asked me if we were going to go to church, I said yes and went. It was a mediocre sermon and I left without any impact on me. It was the first time I went to church in about 6 years. I think my wedding was the last time I was in a church to that point. Anyway, that night my wife and I were outside on our porch talking, and I said to her " do you really think Jesus was literally raised from the dead?" I said it in a condescending way not believing it myself. I began to tell her my theories on it which were maybe he didn't really die on the cross, maybe he was unconscious and woke up later in the tomb. To me it was either that, or the whole story was invented completely. Either way The Word incarnate was not an option. My wife just kind of brushed it off and didn't make much of it. I think she had the mentality that a lot of people do. She didn't put much thought into it, but would never deny Gods existence. After our talk she went in the house, but I stayed outside. I remember looking up at the sky and saying "God, if you exist you'd better do something drastic to me, because the world seems too materialistic for there to be a magic man in the sky. I have 3 kids and if you want me to raise them with faith I need you to prove your existence to me, because I can't teach them something I don't believe." What happened next wasn't a huge miracle, or crazy divine encounter. But what did happen was powerful to me. I went inside and started flipping through the channels. I stumbled on a history channel documentary about the shroud of Turin. I had never heard of it before and it just caught my attention. All I can tell you is when it came on I didn't believe in God, and when it was over I did. God literally stirred up a hunger in me that I can't explain. I spent 15 years trying to disprove Gods existence to having an insatiable desire for him. It was as if he came down and dipped his finger in my brain. Over the last year the changes in my life are so incredible I can't begin to explain them. I have a thousand stories to tell, but I'll stop here for now. Please share your journey with me, and I hope you return for more of mine. Thank you, and God bless.